President of baseball operations David Stearns and his front office must now focus on the trade deadline, where they are almost certain to sell off a number of assets, during a season that has proven to be terrible for the New York Mets. The team’s rental pieces shouldn’t have the same asking price as controllable pieces like Luke Weaver. Either trade those players or let them depart for free.
Brooks Raley, a lefty, is among them. With a 2.35 ERA in 143 career games, the southpaw is currently in his fourth consecutive season with the Mets and has essentially always performed well for them. With a 2.09 ERA in 35 1/3 innings pitched this year, he has been even better. Despite how good he has been, the Mets are already attempting to transfer him since he is a rental. But fortunately for the Mets, the Boston Red Sox have just surfaced as a fresh candidate.
With closer Aroldis Chapman as the top lefty in their bullpen, the Red Sox make a lot of sense for Raley. Even though Chapman has been his typical dominant self this season, Boston needs another lefty to deploy in matchup situations because he is limited to the ninth inning. Raley could easily fill the void in the bullpen left by Danny Coulombe’s recent designation for assignment by the team.
The Mets would be the perfect trade partners for the Red Sox… if Boston buys
Boston’s own difficulties this season are the only possible flaw in this otherwise clear trade fit. They were viewed as surefire sellers not too long ago, and they were probably going to compete with the Mets for buy-side suitors by dangling guys like Chapman and possibly even Sonny Gray. That story has been altered by a recent hot run. They are currently only two games behind after going 9-1 in their past ten games.500 and only one and a half games away from an AL Wild Card place.
That puts them in a position to at least think about purchasing for the time being, but because the trade deadline is still a few weeks away, it’s likely that things will alter once more. All it would take for the Red Sox to cease being a potential trade partner for the Mets and become some of their fiercest rivals on the trade market on deadline day is for them to come out of the All Star break cold. Chapman was thought to be the team’s most likely trade chip just two weeks ago.
It’s difficult to predict what chief baseball officer Craig Breslow and his front office will do in the future given the competitive AL postseason field and Boston’s mediocre performance this season. That being said, if Breslow decides to purchase, he will have a difficult time finding a better trade partner than Stearns, particularly if he wants to combine Chapman with a rental lefty arm toward the bottom of the bullpen.
